'Trading is a process of observing the market's action until such a time you can find and form trading ideas and get involved.'**

Saturday, December 24, 2011

By John Mauldin:

Individual Investors Have Certain Advantages Over Institutions

One final thought. Smaller investors do not realize that they possess quite a few strategic advantages – if only they would take advantage of them. Consider these small-investor pluses:

• No benchmark to meet quarterly (or monthly), so you can have longer-term time horizons and different goals

• You can enter or exit a position without impacting markets.

• There is no public scrutiny of your holdings and no disclosures required, so you don’t have to worry about someone taking your ideas.

• You don’t have to limit yourself to just the largest stocks or worry about position size (this is huge).

• Cost structure, fees, and taxes are within your control.

• You can reverse errors without professional consequences – you don’t get fired for admitting a mistake.

• You can have longer-term time horizons and different goals.

And with those thoughts, good luck and good trading in 2012!